There, grooving away on the dancefloor at 3am, was one of England's leading posh Peter Pans. All around him were comely young things, their haute bohème clothes clinging to their lissom bodies. And, to his right, our 66-year-old hipster thought he saw his god-daughter's back as she too bopped till she dropped. And so - a little, shall we say, refreshed - he went over and patted her affectionately on the bottom. Whereupon an unknown young face swivelled in his direction and an enraged fist socked him on the jaw.

Which encapsulates the perils of party-going Peter Pandom - for clarity's sake, meaning 60 and upward. Are the moves you just bust greeted only as the risible lurchings of the Oldest Swinger in Town? Does even a hint of a tint of drunkenness/stonedness proclaim you to be nothing more than a tragic old sot? Does your eagerness to dance with the prettiest girls at the party simply make you seem like a dirty old man? Might your banter lead to the blush-making response of the delightful young belle, come on to by an ageing Lothario, who sweetly said, 'Didn't you have an affair with my mother?'

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Don't worry: smart young people like oldsters at their parties, if not in their beds. 'You're welcome,' one Guinness told me (for, yes, I too am a Peter Pan). 'Much more fun with oldies there,' said the vivacious Daisy Walker. And, summed up the frolicsome Grace Pilkington, 'I love nothing more than when there are all ages at a party' - a love demonstrated at her sister Silvy's 21st, held last year in Normandy, which pullulated with bright young things and prominent Peter Pans, the Marquess of Worcester among them.

For Bunter - now a fresh-faced 62 - is a prime example of Peter Pandom, his whirling arms and tall, tall torso an ornament of any mixed-age toffish revel. Does he really still like parties? 'I certainly do,' he told me. '"Why" is a more difficult question.' He paused, mulled over the matter. 'I still like dancing, I like seeing beautiful girls, I'm a naturally social animal - I just like the buzz of it all.' Voilà! The Peter Pan's philosophy. But does Worcester fear he might some day look silly? 'I suppose so,' he said glumly. 'But I don't feel it's that moment yet. And I think I'll have a built-in radar which will tell me when to hang up my boots.'

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Or dancing shoes. Christopher Simon Sykes won't, whatever happens. The 66-year-old writer and photographer is a passionate partygoer - 'I was so often the last to leave.' Was? Still is, in my experience. And he is, by his own admission, 'a great dancer. I don't mean I'm a good dancer, but I'm not embarrassed at all. I couldn't care less. I want to go on being an old rock 'n' roller.' Other great - and very good - mature dancers include Lady Jane Wellesley, 63, and 76-year-old Rupert Lycett Green, while Sir Mick Jagger, 71, can still shake a shapely leg at the highest society parties. And if Sir Mick can't dance, who can? Still, Sykes's 'couldn't care less' is important: true toffs don't give a toss what others think.

But dancing's secondary. Parties are largely about the mating game, which still interests both Sir Mick and Charles Glass, that dashing war correspondent. Glass, 64, is straight up about it: 'I go to parties to meet women. I like conversation and I like women, and at good parties you get both.' He warmed to his theme: 'I like to go to parties to see pretty girls and go home with them.'

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Other Peter Pans are just as eager: at a recent revel, one late-60s magnifico told a fiftyish woman publisher that the E he'd popped was just kicking in, adding, 'Shall we go upstairs and have sex?'

An E, eh? Ecstasy is known to play its part, and there are those who purse their lips at tales of oldsters drugging away at parties the young are attending. And too many pills or too much drink should be avoided: one frisky youngster told me that 'when you see someone in their late 60s wasted on pills, it's easy to mock.' She thought for a second. 'That's mocking in a friendly way. But in the same way as it's embarrassing when one of my friends starts losing the plot, it's that much worse when they're in their late 60s. You can't help thinking, "God, I hope I won't be like that." But it really is more fun when there's a mix of ages. And, no, you don't all look like monsters.'

That's a relief. And it's not just the chaps. There are many Petra Pans whose party-going ardour is not one jot diminished and whose glamour is undimmed: Mary Furness (properly Countess Waldegrave), a famous femme fatale and the only woman to have two of Martin Amis's leading women based on her, is, in this respect, a nonpareil. 'She's hugely admired by my kids,' said Mike Pilkington, father of Grace and Silvy, 'for her stamina and attitude.'

Attitude - that's what counts. As an aged Lady Diana Cooper said of parties: 'Always go. You can always leave. And you might meet someone.' Hope springs eternal, and Peter Pans are nothing if not hopeful. Party on, oldster.

How to spot a Grey Raver

He will be wearing black Levi's 501s and new-looking Converse.

His hairstyle is the same as it was in 1984, only now it is grey.

He knew your mum.

He knew her even better in her heyday ('Wink, wink, nudge, you look just like she did,' etc...).

He says he is your godfather, but you've never had a Christmas present from him.

He has a bed in the main house.

It sometimes seems like he's not listening, but actually he is a tad deaf in the left ear. Or maybe just blotto.